A Cure for a Tragedy

Summary:
Everyone knew who he was, the Night's Guardian Jasper Hale, quiet and dangerous. No one knew who she was but Jasper wanted to know. In a world where vampires known are feared, the people rely on a protector but who will protect him?

Notes:
This is an AU story using the Twilight characters and their likeness.

All documents seem to be in order, nothing out of the ordinary as far as paper work. Is living off campus in single apartment alone. No mail comes in or goes out. No visitors. Timely student, and keeps to herself. No parties, no wild behavior, nor police records on file. Nothing more to report as of yet.

That was it?

Jasper turned the paper over expecting to see something more, but that was all the information his defectives had to offer. He was hoping for a little more than that. Normally when he checked into a person's background he got almost a book, but this was two pages, and they were not even full!

He threw the file back into the envelope and sighed in annoyance. He had to be careful who he let himself get close to, after all he was the prince, but this was ridiculous. They had offered him nothing he could not have figured out himself with a game of twenty-one questions.

"So here you are," his mother's sweet voice called from below. "I should have known you would be hiding up there."

She shielded her eyes as she looked several feet above her into the bright light that flooded through the window. It illuminated around Jasper making him look like a dark angel. He wore his favorite color, black. A black shirt, black glove, black shorts that came to his knees, and black boots. In contrast, his blond curls came to life in the sun's light, but his face was drawn into a lifeless stare. The faint scars of battle were highlighted in this light, reminding her of what destiny had in store for her son.

He jumped down from the window nook and landed on the marble floor with ease, despite the long distance. Esme snatched the yellow file from his hand once he was close enough, opening it only long enough to glance at the name on the inside, Alice, before he snatched it back.

"You sent detectives after her," she smiled her 'I-told-you' smile.

"Yes," he defended. "Is that so wrong, I think dad did he same for you-"

"Oh, so you are comparing your feelings for her to that of your father's for me," she retorted and he knew he was caught.

"Mom," he sounded more like a teenager than a prince at that moment. "I'm only saying that with my position I can't trust just anyone."

"Well is she trust worthy," his mother giggled.

There was that word, worthy. He had been turning it over in his head the past few days and had not liked the way it tasted in his mouth. He felt a little ashamed to put on such a high pedestool.

"I don't know, there isn't a lot of information," he looked to the file once more that only contained two pages.

"Well then I guess you are going to have to do this the old fashioned way," Esme giggled.

"What do you mean by that," he sighed. He kind of had an idea.

"I mean dating son," she laughed as a small head peered through the door. "Take her out to lunch and get to know her by TALKING! Don't send your spies."

"Is brother going on a date," his little sister peered up to the towering adults, her curly mahogany hair spiraling around her face. "Who is she?"

"Don't listen to mom," Jasper frowned down on the bi colored eyes. "She is just joking."

His sister's small lip began to pout as she looked to the window. "It's almost dark."

"You should get going," Esme's happy face pulled into a deep frown.

Jasper looked down to a small pressure on his hand, it was so light he almost did not feel it. It was his sister's small hands pulling at his, her blue and green eyes swimming in tears. "Don't go brother . . . what if the monsters get you?"

He kneeled on his knee to look into his sister's eyes. "I have to go so I can keep the monsters away from home. I have to protect the people of our city-"

"But who will protect you," tears were chasing each other down her flushed cheeks.

Jasper's heart dropped at the question, something he had never expected her, such a small child, to think of to ask. In fact, it was a question that had never crossed his own mind.

"That's enough baby," Esme was almost to the point of tears herself, touched by the small child's words.

She scooped the little girl up who buried her head into her mother's shoulder for comfort. "While we are on that subject, your father wanted me to ask if you have seen any changes since your birthday?"

"No," Jasper replied, void of all emotions on his face like almost every moment. "Just same me."

He turned to leave, his mother murmurings into her sister's ear. He was almost out the door when she called back. "Be careful honey. Don't forget you cousins will be arriving tomorrow to start the wedding decorations."

“Yeah, yeah,” he mumbled back before making his way into the night.

Jasper lifted his foot and pushed the clutch, shifting the gear, and slamming back on the gas. He was at 110 in only seconds, pushing 120 mph. He pivoted the car to cross through the brightly illuminated intersection. He was headed towards the center of the town, the area where the least amount of light illuminated; where the greatest chance of finding a vampire was.

The center of town was where the most businesses were, and most of the government buildings. No one lived there, so no lights would be shinning through the glass windows that would not even be barred. Bars could not protect against vampires. It was also where the calmer, richer, people lived. There were no hidden parties going on where people barred themselves away from the danger of the night, only sleeping families. The heart of Prodosia.

He lowered the hood to his black corvette, letting the wind carry the night's scents. He reached the center where he slowed to 70. Everything seemed like a normal night. There were few lights burning from the tall buildings. Each was spaced further apart than further out into the city where they were crowded creating multiple layers of rooftops. No one was walking the streets either, it was against the law, and a death wish. Only the Night's Guardians wondered the streets, and he did this alone.

Japer slammed on his breaks, turning the wheel with one hard thrust. His corvette squealed, and she did not move. The car continued to slide forward even with his foot on the brake petal, and still she did not move. The car slid to a stop, the strong smell of burnt rubber feeling his nose. He stared at her, knowing what she was.

She stood completely still, her back turned to him. Her layered black hair hung loosely around her head. Each strand danced slowly in the wind, brushing the tips of her shoulder, and for a moment his heart gave a jolt of illogical excitement, before quickly dropping. It wasn't her . . . it couldn't be her. Her hair was not sticking upward, but hanging low, reaching close to her shoulder.

"Hey," Jasper shouted, not moving from his car, but placing his weapon in place on his back.

She still did not move, not even a flinch. She looked like a statue minus her clothes that waved in the wind. Her simple black tank top that clung dangerously close to her marble white skin was to tightly fitted to move, but her long, layered, black skirt did wave with the wind's gentle breeze.

She also wore two long black gloves, but their delicate silk told him it was not to protect from the cold. They reached all the way up to her elbow before marble, white skin flashed. Jasper jumped over his car's side, not bothering to use the door. "Hey."

This time she moved, a fluid motion that stopped him in his tracks. She looked over her shoulder, revealing only her strikingly pale skin and her left, blood-red eye.

She was a vampire.

He felt as if she had been waiting just for him. He pulled the sword off from his back, a large blade almost a foot wide and thick. It glittered white in the glare from the streetlights as he awaited the next move. This would not be his first battle with a vampire, nor would it be the last.

She jumped into the air, gliding over his head just out of the reach of him and his sword. Human eyes would not have been fast enough to see her elegant movement, but he was not quit human, he was something a little more. She landed at his back with no more noise than a feather.

She lunged forward, going for his back as he began to turn, swinging his sword with him. As he was about to collide she did something he should have expected. She jumped upward, leaving a small hole in the ground from the force of her jump. She landed in front of him half a second later and he was only an inch away from connecting with her side, but she ducked. He changed the course of his movement, bringing the sword down vertically, but she once again danced around, missing the sword completely.

His sword connected with the ground sending large chunks of pavement flying. The vampire took this moment to strike his back, sending him hurtling forward into the air. He landed into the ground so hard he bounced upward before landing again only to continue to slide on his shoulder, ripping most of the sleeve. Yet, it didn't hurt as bad as it should have, even as his sliding path was interrupted by a streetlight's pole.

He stood up with his sword still in his right hand, and began to check what little skin was showing between his shirt's sleeves and his glove. The skin was slightly red from sliding on pavement, but that was the worse she had done. He looked from his arm to where she was standing, waiting. She tilted her head to the side almost curious like, almost cat-like he realized, She placed one hand on her hip and her black hair that barely brushed against her shoulder's top swarmed around her with the breeze.

She was toying with him, testing his abilities. Somehow she knew he wasn't her average meal. Great, he was even famous with vampires. He brought his sword back into ready position, in front of him and felt energy coursing through him. It was unlike nothing he had ever felt. It coursed through him like fire, burning to get out.

He ran forward aiming for her stone body, but just like he figured she jumped out of his way, but he was prepared. He grabbed her ankle pulling her back to the ground and thrusting her into the pavement. There was a loud crunching sound as he grabbed the hilt of his sword with two hands and swung the blade to her. She rolled out of the way and he swung horizontally, but she flipped over it, landing with force that broke the ground once more.

She round kicked, her foot colliding with his jaw. He grabbed her leg with his free hand, pushing her to fall on her back and swinging his sword where she should land, but she was too fast. Their dance continued this way for what seemed like hours with the great amount of movement. They were moving at speeds so fast no human eyes could have followed. At first, many hits from each connected. Every time his sword clashed against a part of her body a high pitch clanging reverberated through the streets and miles away people awoke from its noise, and every time he cut into her, the wound was not deep enough and the skin grew back too quick for him to take advantage.

Then the fight became predictable, his sword would always be only a brush away from colliding with her stony white skin. Her fists, and kicks, would also be only millimeters away, if not less, from colliding with his own body, as they danced around the streets. Then the tables turned.

He jabbed his sword forward and she slid to the side, giving only enough room for the sword to slide through the small opening between her arm and her side. She closed her iron grip on it, making it momentarily impossible to pull the sword away from her grip, not that he had time to do so. Within the next second she kicked him in the chest, wrenching his grip from the sword's hilt and flying in the air.

He pulled his head forward to see her running to him at lightning speed. He could see her teeth glinting in the light as she prepared to finish him. All the energy that had been coursing through him, that had been burning to escape, reached its peak and he acted on impulse. He raised his hand and opened it and all at once his entire arm burned until it escaped through his hand in one, fiery flash of light.

He saw her face grow wide in surprise before she dodged to her right, but her surprise had used too much of her time. He could hear her scream before she was lost from his sight.

Jasper felt his back collide with the pavement once more. He bounced flipping over till his face was parallel with the pavement. He caught himself with his hand, digging his heels in the ground to slow his movement until he came to a stop.

He looked up and saw his sword exactly twenty feet from his current position and seventeen feet away from the vampire. She was standing up, but she was not looking at either him, or his sword. She was tugging at her right glove that was burning close to her elbow. It was on fire! She pulled it off throwing it to the ground, but something was not right.

From the tip of her fingers to mid palm where white skin should have been, was instead solid black. The skin looked dried and old, as if it were made from black soot. She looked at it not in shock, because that was not where the burning had started on the glove. She looked at it in sorrow, before turning without another look to Jasper and disappearing in a flash into the night.